


Hot Chocolate

by unbirthdaydance



Category: SHINee
Genre: M/M, Romance, Winter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-19
Updated: 2013-11-19
Packaged: 2018-01-02 00:51:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,522
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1050564
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unbirthdaydance/pseuds/unbirthdaydance
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It becomes a tradition between them to sit and watch the snow fall, hot chocolate in hand, year after year.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hot Chocolate

* * *

Taemin sits in the window and looks out at the falling gusts of snow. He puts a hand against the cold glass and feels condensation gather beneath his palm. It’s his first winter living at the dorm away from home. He misses his family, his dogs, the snow fights he used to have with his brother.

The snow swirls down faster, faster, blanketing the frozen earth with a vengeance. Taemin shivers.

The smell of something warm and rich floods his senses. He shifts around to see Kibum approaching with two steaming mugs of thick liquid.

“Hot chocolate,” Kibum explains, handing Taemin one.

Taemin takes it cautiously, the ceramic hot against his fingers. Kibum climbs onto the window seat next to him. Their feet touch. Taemin takes a sip of his drink and smiles at the sweetness.

“Thanks, hyung,” he says.

“Cheers,” says Kibum playfully, raising his mug.

Their mugs clink together. Taemin takes another sip. Kibum curls the toes of his fuzzy socks against Taemin’s skinny ankle. Taemin stops shivering. The snow continues to fall from the sky in gorgeous curls of icy white wind.

~~~

It becomes a tradition between them to sit and watch the snow fall, hot chocolate in hand, year after year.

Sometimes they find patterns in the snow, draw rude pictures in the fog on the window, laugh about the waddling efforts of bundled-up babies to stagger away from their parents down the sidewalk. Sometimes Taemin falls asleep in Kibum’s lap, drink finished and belly warm. Sometimes he pretends to fall asleep, just so he can feel the way Kibum strokes his hair when he thinks Taemin is not awake.

Their little tradition makes winter much more bearable. The floors are no longer so chilly when he’s curled up with Kibum on the window seat. Wearing three sweaters when the heating breaks becomes unnecessary when snuggled under a thick blanket with his hyung, playfully blowing steam into each other’s faces.

It is hard to be cold with the spicy sweetness of hot chocolate deep within him.

~~~

One year, Kibum abandons their tradition. He is too busy, in a swirl of schedules and new friends and mysterious late-night trips, to sit at the window with Taemin and drink hot chocolate. He brushes off Taemin’s queries, his pleading, with a hundred different excuses.

Taemin makes hot chocolate by himself. It does not taste delicious. He sits at the window and watches the streets below, the gray icy slush at the side of the road, the way Kibum comes back later and later, once carefully wiping lipstick off his cheek as he exits a taxi home.

“Hyung,” says Taemin, as he has said before, time and time again.

“Not now, Taeminnie, I’m busy,” Kibum answers with careless disinterest. He is currently very occupied with his phone. “I don’t have time for this nonsense-”

“ _Please_ ,” says Taemin.

There’s something jagged in his voice, something that finally makes Kibum look over at him, at their window, at the gray curtains of snow.

“Just for a bit, then,” Kibum sighs.

He takes a seat next to Taemin on the window. They sit there for eleven minutes. Kibum doesn’t stop texting the entire time, chewing his bottom lip with teenaged impatience.

Taemin gazes at the junction of the window sill and Kibum’s knee, hot chocolate-less. He shivers badly to the sound of the wind howling outside.

~~~

The next year fares no better. Kibum’s indifference is apologetic rather than annoyed, but no less cold for that. Taemin, a year older and wiser, does not press the issue. He sits alone at their window, inferior-quality hot chocolate in hand, wrapped in the thickest blankets he can find. He gazes out at the lumbering snow-plows, watching their giant shovels catch piles of slush and toss it to the side, unwanted, unneeded, unnecessary.

~~~

Taemin does not return to the window seat the year after that. It was a childish tradition. He is mature now, just like Kibum. Besides, the entire band is busy, wrapped up in a harried string of schedules and promotions that would have left very little time for snow-gazing anyway.

Thus one day, despite the sudden flurry cascading from the skies, Taemin finds himself sitting at the kitchen table and doing his homework. His mouth aches for the taste of chocolate and the softness of marshmallows, but he does not leave his seat.

Kibum, unexpectedly, wanders by.

“Taemin,” he says. “It’s snowing.”

Taemin doesn’t look up. “So?”

A pause, long and awkward. Kibum’s fingers brush against the nape of Taemin’s neck.

“You usually like to sit at the window,” Kibum says after a moment. “I just thought I’d tell you, in case you hadn’t noticed the weather…”

“I’m busy,” says Taemin. He stares hard at his textbook, jaw tense. “Just like you.”

Another pause. Taemin reads the same sentence over and over again to drown out the silence and cannot comprehend anything.

“I’ll make you some hot chocolate,” Kibum says finally, softly. “I promised some friends I’d go meet them soon, but I have time to mix a drink up if you-”

“I’m _busy_ ,” says Taemin, sharper like sleet.

Kibum’s fingertips linger at his neck for a few more seconds. Then he says quietly, “I’m sorry,” and leaves, footsteps barely audible against the chilly kitchen tiles.

Taemin waits for him to go. Then he buries his head in his arms, eyes wet. He remains like that until the cold becomes too much, and he must go in search of yet another sweater to add to the two he is already wearing.

~~~

They wind up overseas for most of the winter that same year, on tour. One Saturday night, Taemin falls into bed in the hotel room he shares with Jonghyun, completely exhausted and happily anticipating at least thirteen straight hours of sleep.

He is rudely awoken far too early the next morning by someone shaking him, roughly and without mercy. Taemin groans, rolls over and drags a pillow over his face.

“Taemin,” a voice hisses into his ear, making him squirm. “Get _up_!”

“Nghrhghh,” says Taemin. He squints out from underneath the pillow at the alarm clock. “It’s four in the morning.”

“So? Wake _up_!”

Suddenly his blanket is gone, leaving Taemin whimpering in the sudden icy gust of morning air. He sits up, rubs his eyes blearily and sees Kibum smirking at him.

“Be ready in ten minutes,” Kibum orders. He drops Taemin’s blanket on the ground and kicks it into a corner. “We’re going out.”

“Out?” says Taemin. “But- hyung- _four in the morning_ -?”

Kibum is already gone in a swirl of fuzzy pink bathrobe. Taemin sighs, glances over at a still-snoring Jonghyun and climbs out of bed, teeth chattering.

~~~

Twelve minutes later, he is following Kibum out of their hotel and into a waiting taxi. Although he is bundled up in his warmest clothing and coats and scarves, Taemin shivers uncontrollably as the icy breeze nips the exposed parts of his face.

Kibum settles into the passenger’s seat of the taxi next to the driver and carefully places a large backpack between his feet. Taemin doesn’t listen as his hyung gives the driver directions. He huddles against the fogged windowpane in the back seat and falls asleep, lulled by the rhythmic purring shudder of the taxi against the frozen pavement.

Taemin is woken again by Kibum shaking him. He groans and mutters unhappily, then rolls out of the taxi and follows Kibum into a large, run-down building. The sign over its front door is faded and peeling. Giant icicles hang beneath the sides of a roof missing half its tiles.

The place turns out to be an ice-skating rink, of all places. Taemin waits while Kibum speaks with the old lady sitting behind the front desk, both of them communicating in awkward, four-thirty-in-the-morning English. Eventually, the wrinkled woman slides two pairs of skates over the desk, then plugs her iPhone earbuds into her ears and dozes off again.

“Hyung,” whispers Taemin after Kibum has led him around the side of the rink to put the skates on. “I didn’t think anywhere would be open this early on a weekend.”

“It’s not,” Kibum whispers back, eyes sparkling with mischief. “I uh, paid them kind of a lot to let us do this.”

Taemin’s fingers still on the laces of his skate. He gazes at Kibum in disbelief.

“Isn’t that illegal?”

Kibum shrugs. “Maybe? If so, it’s their fault for having sketchy renting practices.” He winks. “I had to call about six different places before I found one that would let us in.”

Taemin still cannot stop staring. “But why did you want to come here so early?”

“I wanted to be back before everyone else woke up,” Kibum says. He shoves lightly at Taemin’s arm. “Put your skates on.”

Taemin gives up on trying to understand anything and finishes tying his laces. He stands, wobbling, and makes it to the entrance of the rink. Kibum follows him, panting a little as he hauls his enormous backpack along.

Oddly, a table and two chairs are sitting in the middle of the ice rink. Taemin blinks, then shrugs and carefully skates towards the little set-up. Kibum shuffles behind him, cursing every so often each time he almost falls over.

Taemin takes a seat in one of the chairs. Kibum sits in the other and drops his backpack onto the ice. He bends over and unzips it, then starts pulling items out.

“Oh good,” says Taemin, snatching up a pair of chopsticks and a small plastic container. “You brought food!”

Kibum laughs at him. Taemin grins and ignores this. He bites hungrily into the still-warm food.

The last things Kibum puts on the table are two tall travelling mugs and a very large sealed thermos. He straightens and unscrews the thermos. Taemin sucks in a breath as a familiar smell wafts out, a scent he’d thought long-forgotten.

“It might not be as hot as I’d like,” Kibum confesses. He carefully pours hot chocolate into the mug nearest Taemin. “The taxi ride took longer than I thought it would.”

Taemin wraps his hands around the mug and brings it to his mouth. He inhales deeply. It has been so long since Kibum has made his special drink that Taemin cannot quite remember what it used to taste like. The moment the hot liquid spills over his tongue and trickles down his throat, however, he wonders how on earth he had ever forgotten such deliciousness.

Kibum is laughing at him again, this time a surprised, pleased laugh at the blissed-out expression on Taemin’s face.

“Don’t forget the marshmallows,” he says as he tosses a bag across the table. Taemin catches it and eagerly adds the squishy sweet bits to melt in the rich chocolate.

At first, they eat like starved wolves, tired and needing the fading warmth of breakfast in the cold air of the ice rink. Then they drink hot chocolate. Taemin’s breath puffs into little clouds as he exhales between sips. He watches Kibum’s tongue flick out to lick a marshmallow into his mouth.

Taemin finally breaks the silence. “It was nice of you to do this, hyung.”

Kibum swallows down a mouthful of hot chocolate.

“I wanted to do our old window thing again,” he says, apologetic. “But I wasn’t sure if you wanted to, and we’ve been so busy with this comeback…”

Taemin shifts in his chair. “Hyung-”

Kibum sighs, ignoring him. “So I figured we could do it while we were travelling because that wouldn’t be _as_ weird, and we’d have time, only-”

“Um, hyung-”

“Only, there wasn’t any snow,” Kibum finishes, rueful. “So I bribed us into an ice rink instead. I’m sorry; I know it’s not really the same-”

“ _Hyung_ ,” says Taemin. “When I said this was nice, I meant it.”

Kibum’s eyes widen. “Oh.”

Taemin smiles at him. Kibum returns the smile. They drink more hot chocolate. They talk. The rays of the sun filter in from the tiny slits of windows around the top of the rink’s walls, casting Kibum’s form in the gentle orange glow of sunrise. They talk some more.

Finally, it is time to go. Once all the containers have been packed up and the table wiped clean, Taemin levers himself to his feet. Kibum swings the backpack over his shoulders and they start skating towards the exit.

Neither of them are the best skaters. As they approach near the rink edge, they stumble and wind up tangled. Taemin splays his hands against the wall to keep from falling over. Kibum, his backpack crushed against the wall, clings to Taemin’s thick coat to steady himself. Their faces brush together, cold nose to cold cheek.

The iciness of the rink begins to fade from Taemin’s core at the warmth of Kibum’s body pressed against his own. He cannot remember how long he’d been frozen, but soon the stiff numbness of being chilled for far too long melts completely. Kibum's warm breaths intermingle with Taemin's own, puffing against chapped lips.

“Taemin,” Kibum murmurs. His gloved fingers twist into the layers of Taemin’s coat and sweaters. Taemin takes one hand off the wall and settles his arm around Kibum’s waist to hold him close. Kibum’s breath hitches at the touch, eyelashes fluttering, as beautiful as any ice sculpture in the faint light of sunrise.

Taemin dares to kiss him, a gentle, chaste press of mouth to mouth. Kibum wraps his arms tighter around Taemin, body deliciously warm against Taemin’s own. His soft noises of pleasure make Taemin’s scarf burn hot and sweaty around his neck. The moment crystallizes, as perfect as a snowflake.

After an eternity, they draw apart. Kibum’s fingers are still twined in Taemin’s thick coat, his ragged breathing frosting the small amount of air between them. Taemin rests their foreheads together. Kibum gazes at him, smiling soft and shy.

“Kiss me again,” he breathes.

Taemin is only too eager to comply, a hot thrill jolting through him at the needy little sound Kibum makes when their lips meet once more. A droplet of sweat trickles down his back as he crushes Kibum against the wall, skates scraping against the ice. Kibum makes _that sound_ again at this manhandling, and suddenly Taemin can no longer stand the slow and scorching pace.

He deepens the kiss, licking at Kibum’s yielding mouth and tasting the lingering richness of chocolate on Kibum’s lips. His tongue ventures further, to savor the sugariness of marshmallows at the edge of Kibum’s teeth and the faint spiciness of cinnamon at the arch of the roof of his mouth. He tangles his tongue with Kibum’s own and finds nothing but sweetness.

It’s the best hot chocolate he has ever tasted and the best rendition of their tradition yet, even given the lack of snow and windowsill.

(And even, some very heated minutes later, after an embarrassing discovery by the ice rink’s lone employee. But Kibum’s hand is warm tucked into Taemin’s own, and as they steal kisses during the taxi ride back, Taemin finds it hard to care about anything except the sweetness of Kibum’s smile.)


End file.
